Northwood teachers contract will be decided by March voters

NORTHWOOD — The final decision on the Northwood teachers contract will be in voters' hands when they head to the polls next month.

After a couple months of debating, negotiations and a failed mediation, a compromise between the School Board and teacher's association was achieved after a fact-finding process.

"It was very representative of the issues," said John Fillipon, a science teacher at the middle school. "... Both the teacher's association and School Board thought it was a fair compromise and agreed to it."

The teacher's association unanimously approved the fact-finder's proposal, while the School Board voted 3-1 in favor of it.

"We felt the recommendations were heavily weighed to the School Board position and voted to support it," School Board Chair Colleen Pingree said.

In previous contract talks, there were many things the teacher's association and the School Board agreed upon, but differences over salary increases and medical insurance copayments caused an impasse.

"Some people in the association were maybe a little stuck on their point of view and I'm sure there were some on the School Board side," Fillipon said. "It's good for those people to have an individual third party come in. Personally, I think it would have been better if we were open minded on both sides so we didn't have to do it to begin with."

Another hurdle in the negotiations was that the School Board wanted to increase instruction time by 15 minutes. The reasoning behind this, Pingree said, is because the School Board felt there needed to be a justification in salary raises.

Pingree said Northwood is listed as a school in need of improvement by the state, and the increase in instructional time would put them at the same level as others in region. She said the School Board felt the additional time would let the school improve and compete on the same level with other schools.

Gary Altman, of Brookline, Mass., who prepared the fact-finding report, confirmed Northwood did have a lower instructional time than other schools around the region. The instruction time in Northwood is 6.25 hours, with a total 7.25 hour workday for teachers. Strafford's instructional time is 6.50 hours with a 7.50 work day, while Barrington's is 6.25 with a 7.50 hour workday. Nottingham's total workday is 7.35 hours, with 6.33 hours of instructional time.

For this reason, Altman suggested adding the additional 15 minutes, with teachers required to be on the school premises 20 minutes before school and 25 minutes after dismissal.

Teachers would see an increase in instructional time from 31 hours and 15 minutes to 32 hours and 30 minutes per week.

Teachers said they were concerned about this additional hour a week because it would mean a 4 percent workload increase their current salaries would not compensate them for. Because of this increase in time, Altman agreed with teachers that their time would need to be compensated.

On compensation grounds, he also turned down the school board's earlier proposal for employees to pay an additional 5 percent copay toward the cost of health insurance.

The school board suggested this copay was a way to decrease the rising costs the district is paying and ease the burden on tax payers. This year there would be a 13.3 percent increase in premium costs for the Blue Choice medical plan, the School Board said.

The district now pays 95 percent for a single membership, 90 percent for a two-person and 85 percent for a full family membership to all full-time employees.

The association argued that having teachers pay more in health insurance would mean no increase in their compensation, and that there were many other districts in the region who have had the same increase in health insurance costs, but have not made their teachers pay more.

In Barrington, the district pays 85 percent across the board for the Blue Choice medical plan, while in Strafford, it's 95 percent for a single membership, 88 percent for a two-person membership and 80 percent for a full family's. In Nottingham, the district pays 95 percent for a single plan, 88 percent for a two-person plan and 85 percent for a family.

Altman said he did not see a justification in increasing the cost to employees since they were generally at the same rate of others in the region. He added that with the increase of instructional time, it would take away from teachers' pay.

He recommended a two year agreement. For the 2011-2012 school year he suggested no employee health care cost changes, but in the following year, for the district pay to change to 92 percent for a single plan, 88 percent for a two-person membership and 84 percent for a family.

Pingree said she was particularly happy with this proposal.

"We will see a projected health care savings of at least $2,800 next year," she said. "... That's a permanent savings every year."

The school board, along with the 5 percent copayment, also suggested lowering the insurance buyout from $5,000 to $2,000. They said they increased the buyout as an incentive to get more teachers to opt out of the insurance plan, but instead found the same four teachers had chosen the buyout again.

Altman said in his report that the buyout was "too large a concession and employees who elect the buy-out should not have such a large decrease in their overall compensation." He instead suggested that employees who currently receive the $5,000 buy-out to continue with the payment and that after July 1, 2011 any employee who opts out of the medical insurance plan will receive $2,000.

With an increase in health insurance in the second year and an increase in instructional time, Altman said teachers would need to see a salary increase.

The association originally asked for a three-year salary agreement with a 4 percent raise in the 2011-2012 school year and 3 percent raises for the next two years after. They argued that the salaries of Northwood teachers are below those paid in surrounding towns.

Northwood currently pays teachers $29,248 in starting salaries and $52,543 for a top salary. Barrington pays $28,238 to start and $63,180 at the top scale step, while Strafford pays $35,847 to start and $58,787 at the highest level. Nottingham pays the same top salary as Strafford, but starts teachers at $30,703.

In addition, the association argued that pay increases over the last three years have not kept pace with inflation and the district had plans to increase the wages for administrators this year while for the past two years teachers who have been at the top of their salary schedule have had no increase in wages despite living costs increasing. They added that Northwood was recently awarded $75,782 in additional funds by the Federal Education Jobs Fund and that the wage proposal is reasonable and affordable.

The board suggested a $1,300 increase for all teachers in the 2011-2012 school year and no increase in 2012-2013, except for eligible teachers receiving step advancements.

Altman instead suggested giving all teachers a 2.75 percent increase each year for two years. This would mean teachers at the current starting salary would have an increase of $804.32 and teachers at the top of the pay scale would receive $1,444.93.

Never miss a story

Choose the plan that's right for you.
Digital access or digital and print delivery.